Teach him the song that no one living knows? Let the man die, with that half-chant of his,-What Now discovers not Hereafter shows,

And God will surely teach him more than this.

Again the Bird. I turned, and passed along;

But Time and Death, Eternity and Change, Talked with me ever, and the climbing song Rose in my hearing, beautiful and strange.

THE CHILD-MUSICIAN.

Η

Till the poor little head was heavy,
And the poor little brain would swim.

E had played for his lordship's levee,
He had played for her ladyship's whim,

And the face grew peaked and eerie,

And the large eyes strange and bright, And they said-too late-" He is weary! He shall rest for, at least, To-night!"

But at dawn, when the birds were waking,
As they watched in the silent room,
With the sound of a strained cord breaking,
A something snapped in the gloom.

'Twas a string of his violoncello,

And they heard him stir in his bed: "Make room for a tired little fellow,

Kind God!" was the last that he said.

THE CRADLE.

H

OW steadfastly she'd worked at it!
How lovingly had drest
With all her would-be-mother's wit
That little rosy nest!

How longingly she'd hung on it !—
It sometimes seemed, she said,
There lay beneath its coverlet
A little sleeping head.

He came at last, the tiny guest,
Ere bleak December fled;

That rosy nest he never prest....
Her coffin was his bed.

159

BEFORE SEDAN.

"The dead hand clasped a letter."

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE.

HERE, in this leafy place,

Quiet he lies,

Cold, with his sightless face
Turned to the skies;

'Tis but another dead; All you can say is said.

Carry his body hence,—

Kings must have slaves;
Kings climb to eminence

Over men's graves:
So this man's eye is dim ;—
Throw the earth over him.

What was the white you touched,
There, at his side?

Paper his hand had clutched

Tight ere he died ;— Message or wish, may be ;— Smooth the folds out and see.

Hardly the worst of us

Here could have smiled!

Only the tremulous

Words of a child ;

Prattle, that has for stops
Just a few ruddy drops.

Look. She is sad to miss,
Morning and night,
His-her dead father's-kiss;
Tries to be bright,
Good to mamma, and sweet.
That is all. "Marguerite."

Ah, if beside the dead

Slumbered the pain ! Ah, if the hearts that bled Slept with the slain !

If the grief died ;—But no ;-
Death will not have it so.

M